Workshops
Eastlab Dance Company: Frocks, Socks and the Orange Fox
June 2023
Eastlab Dance Company (Matilda Rowland and Rosie Roberts) invited me to input into the development and devising process for their new show, Frocks, Socks and the Orange Fox. The piece was created for early years audiences, and toured to libraries in Derbyshire in summer 2023. This was the company’s first foray into making dance theatre work for young audiences, and they were looking for support and advice on storytelling through movement, integrating comedy into their work, and audience engagement.
Frocks, Socks and the Orange Fox- promo photo by Elly Wellford
I was with them for two half-day sessions during their rehearsals at Déda, Derby. At the first, I ran a workshop introducing Clowndance material, and at the second I supported the development of a few specific sections of the piece. We also did a very brief introduction to some puppetry techniques. They were particularly keen to find a choreographic language to work with a pre-recorded audio narration. I was excited to be able to move some of the material I have been exploring in short workshop contexts into a dance devising process, with a much clearer focus on a specific performance outcome.
It was a pleasure working with Matilda and Rosie, and with their design team, who joined us on the second day, and I would like to thank them for playing and exploring so openheartedly.
The sessions covered:
It was a pleasure working with Matilda and Rosie, and with their design team, who joined us on the second day, and I would like to thank them for playing and exploring so openheartedly.
The sessions covered:
- Games for playing with each other and the audience: comment and communication
- Character movement development (material gleaned from my professional practice as a movement director). Particularly focusing on developing the pair of them as a double act- working on differentiation and clarity
- Exploring different options for choreographing the dialogue sections of the show
- Body Part Solos- to explore playful and highly focused movement, with a sense of commenting to the audience
- Finding the game for each of several sections within the piece, building a few clearly defined visual gags or moments of physical comedy into each
Moment 1- Dancing:
We warmed up by playing a very simple game that I’ve borrowed from Jon Davison: Dancing (Davison, 2015, p. 25). We walk in the space, and when a piece of music comes on, you make eye contact with someone and dance with them, holding eye contact, until the music stops. As there were only three of us, there was always a spare wheel, who then had options- they could dance alone, watch, or take photos or video.
The documenting captured some lovely moments of facial expression between dancers; people completely in the moment, enjoying playing with another human. This doesn’t seem like a big thing, but it’s still so rare for dancers to really think about what their faces are doing, and it transforms what the audience see.
We warmed up by playing a very simple game that I’ve borrowed from Jon Davison: Dancing (Davison, 2015, p. 25). We walk in the space, and when a piece of music comes on, you make eye contact with someone and dance with them, holding eye contact, until the music stops. As there were only three of us, there was always a spare wheel, who then had options- they could dance alone, watch, or take photos or video.
The documenting captured some lovely moments of facial expression between dancers; people completely in the moment, enjoying playing with another human. This doesn’t seem like a big thing, but it’s still so rare for dancers to really think about what their faces are doing, and it transforms what the audience see.
If you are thinking clearly you will see it in your face
Reflective Roll note: 12/06/23
Reflective Roll note: 12/06/23
Matilda Rowland and Rosie Roberts...
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...pull faces as they move!
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Moment 2- The Third Eye:
As we were playing the applause game, where the performer has to work out from the audience’s reactions what it is they want her to do, Rosie observed a shift in her sense of presence. She felt that the focus between her onstage, and myself and Matilda, watching, was more of an active two-way process than she was used to, and that this freed her up a little physically and psychologically. There was less of a sense of the performer transmitting something to the audience, and more of a sense of dialogue. Literally, in this case, as we were signalling to her with our applause.
She described the sensation later as ‘looking with a third eye of focus’ which allowed her to be completely present and connected with the audience, while trusting her body to know what to do.
As we were playing the applause game, where the performer has to work out from the audience’s reactions what it is they want her to do, Rosie observed a shift in her sense of presence. She felt that the focus between her onstage, and myself and Matilda, watching, was more of an active two-way process than she was used to, and that this freed her up a little physically and psychologically. There was less of a sense of the performer transmitting something to the audience, and more of a sense of dialogue. Literally, in this case, as we were signalling to her with our applause.
She described the sensation later as ‘looking with a third eye of focus’ which allowed her to be completely present and connected with the audience, while trusting her body to know what to do.
When the focus is on being present your body can just get on with it – as dancers we have that available to us
Reflective Roll note: 12/06/23
Reflective Roll note: 12/06/23
Moment 3- Sock Solos:
At the end of the first session, we moved on to create some short solos. The choreographic game here was to create a solo led by one misbehaving body part, in this case a foot wearing a single sock. Many of my workshops have focused entirely on improvisation, but as this was a longer session, we were able to shift a gear and think about creating set material, and how the same principles of play, vulnerability and communication with the audience could exist within a choreographic framework.
At the end of the first session, we moved on to create some short solos. The choreographic game here was to create a solo led by one misbehaving body part, in this case a foot wearing a single sock. Many of my workshops have focused entirely on improvisation, but as this was a longer session, we were able to shift a gear and think about creating set material, and how the same principles of play, vulnerability and communication with the audience could exist within a choreographic framework.
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What struck me, watching the solos, was how the two dancers had mixed the clown and dance elements into quite different cocktails, even with the same choreographic start point. Matilda’s solo focused on precise and playful movement vocabulary, while Rosie’s was more about her sharing an emotional response with the audience. As they were still experimenting the playing style for the piece, it was lovely to see them embodying two different, but equally valid, responses to the work I’d offered them.
Much of the focus in this session was on supporting these two dancers to feel confident exploring character and narrative-led performance. Our main discovery was actually how small a step it can be, and that dancers' toolkits already contain so much of what they need; it just needs a slight shift of context.
Here follow a few quotes from the reflective roll and personal post-its:
Here follow a few quotes from the reflective roll and personal post-its:
We don’t have to act, we can do ‘honest lying’- clearly playing a game
Access characters through movement & play as opposed to acting- use what you know!
Access characters through movement & play as opposed to acting- use what you know!
Ethical Research Statement
This practical research was carried out with ethical approval from the Doctoral College at De Montfort University, Leicester, UK. Participants have all given explicit consent for their workshop activity and reflections (both verbal and written) to be included in the research write-up and on this research website. Where participants are students, not professional artists, I have used pseudonyms to protect their identities.